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Right to Development

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A primary, guiding text on the right to development is the Declaration on the Right to Development which provides in Article 1, Paragraph 1 that the right to development is an inalienable human right by virtue of which every human person and all peoples are entitled to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized.

As clarified by the United Nations Independent Expert on the Right to Development, the right to development is:

  • the right to a particular process of development that allows the realization of economic, social and cultural rights, as well as civil and political rights, and all fundamental freedoms, by expanding the capabilities and choices of the individual. Any increase of human development, carried out in a participatory, accountable, transparent and non-discriminatory manner that improves equity and justice by reducing poverty, will be consistent with the human rights approach to development; and
  • a ‘vector’ of different elements, including the right to food, the right to healthy, the right to education, the right to housing and other economic, social and cultural rights, as well as all the civil and political rights, together with rates of growth of representative resources such as per capita consumption, output and enjoyment. The requirement for improving the right to development is that at least some of the rights can be increasingly realized while no other deteriorates in realization or is violated, regardless of whether they are civil or political rights or any of the economic, social and cultural rights, and there is sustained growth of overall resources.

The international community has a duty to cooperate to enable the States parties to fulfil its obligations under the right to development. Otherwise implementing a plan of development with fundamental institutional changes within individual nation-states may not be possible. Such international cooperation cannot be considered only in terms of transfer of resources. On their own part, developing countries must enact legislation that empowers beneficiaries at the grassroots level, allocates investment and restructures production to promote equity and sustainable growth with resources (i.e., gross domestic product, output and employment, legal, technical and institutional resources) available.

Minimum Core Content

States parties to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights bear non-derogable core obligations with respect to the right to development. For example, States are obligated to ensure the right to a process that expands the capabilities or freedom of individuals to improve their well-being and to realize what they value. As such, the United Nations General Assembly noted in paragraph 9 of its Resolution 56/150 that the realization of the rights to food, health and education may be important development entry points to the realization of the right to development.

Some important quantifying and qualifying tools that are useful when monitoring program service delivery on the right to development are:

Right to Development Dossier

Key Right to Development Cases and Advances

Significant advances toward the full realization of the right to own land and other property continue to be made. Some initial resources on the right are:

The following case studies and summaries illustrate how human rights defenders have used the ESC rights approach to promote and protect the right to development:

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